cons' Graveyard and wait there?' she
asked into the air, and passed on rustling.

'She's pretending to ask one of the cousins, isn't she?' said Dan, and
Puck nodded.

Back she came in the silent, swaying, ghostly dance. They saw she was
smiling beneath the mask, and they could hear her breathing hard.

'I cannot lend you any of my ships for the venture; Philip would hear
of it,' she whispered over her shoulder; 'but as much guns and powder as
you ask, if you do not ask too--'Her voice shot up and she stamped her
foot thrice. 'Louder! Louder, the music in the gallery! Oh, me, but I
have burst out of my shoe!'

She gathered her skirts in each hand, and began a curtsy. 'You will go
at your own charges,' she whispered straight before her. 'Oh, enviable
and adorable age of youth!' Her eyes shone through the mask-holes. 'But
I warn you you'll repent it. Put not your trust in princes--or Queens.
Philip's ships'll blow you out of water. You'll not be frightened? Well,
we'll talk on it again, when I return from Rye, dear lads.'

The wonderful curtsy ended. She stood up. Nothing stirred on her except
the rush of the shadows.

'And so it was finished,' she said to the children. 'Why d'you not
applaud?'

'What was finished?' said Una.

'The dance,' the lady replied offendedly. 'And a pair of green shoes.'

'I don't understand a bit,' said Una.

'Eh? What did you make of it, young Burleigh?'

'I'm not quite sure,' Dan began, 'but--'

'You never can be--with a woman. But--?'

'But I thought Gloriana meant the cousins to go back to the Gascons'
Graveyard, wherever that was.'

''Twas Virginia after-wards. Her plantation of Virginia.'

'Virginia afterwards, and stop Philip from taking it. Didn't she say
she'd lend 'em guns?'

'Right so. But not ships--then.'

'And I thought you meant they must have told her they'd do it off their
own bat, without getting her into a row with Philip. Was I right?'

'Near enough for a Minister of the Queen. But remember she gave the
lads full time to change their minds. She was three long days at Rye
Royal--knighting of fat Mayors. When she came back to Brickwall, they
met her a mile down the road, and she could feel their eyes burn through
her riding-mask. Chris Hatton, poor fool, was vexed at it.

'"YOU would not birch them when I gave you the chance," says she to
Chris. "Now you must get me half an hour's private speech with 'em in
Brickwall garden. Eve tempted Adam in a garden.